Euro Export UK Leading Exporter of Secondhand Clothing and Textiles

Company overview

Euro Export U.K. Ltd is a British collector, sorter and exporter based at Storage King, 133 Birmingham Road, Birmingham B71 4JZ. Its collectors work daily on door-to-door rounds, and the clothing goes from the hanger straight into the sorting operation, where it is graded for buyers in East and West Africa, South Africa and Eastern Europe.

Alongside clothing the company exports used mobile phones, used tyres and domestic electrical goods including televisions and fridges, mainly towards Eastern Europe.

The most useful number published anywhere in this directory

Euro Export states that cream is about 5 percent of second-hand clothing.

Very few suppliers put that fraction in writing, and it explains more about pricing than any price list. Run the arithmetic on any plant you are considering: a sorter handling 20 tonnes a day produces roughly one tonne of cream from it, and that tonne has to satisfy every buyer who wants the top grade. That is why cream sells out, why the gap between cream and Grade A is wide rather than incremental, and why cream allocations tend to go to long-standing customers first.

It also gives you a test. If a supplier offers unlimited cream at a modest premium over Grade A, ask what share of their intake it represents. Either their answer is far above 5 percent, in which case their cream is somebody else's Grade A, or they are buying it in from another sorter, which is a legitimate business but a different one. The published grade definitions describe what the word should mean, and the account of how sorting houses skim a stream explains why the top slice is always thin.

What they actually look for

The selection criteria are named: quality, strength of colour, brands and cleanliness.

Three of those are obvious. Strength of colour is the one worth pausing on, because it is the criterion new buyers most often miss. A garment can be structurally perfect, unmarked and from a good label, and still be unsellable because it has been washed forty times and the black has gone grey. Fading is the most common reason a technically sound piece drops out of the top grade, and a sorter that names colour as an explicit test is applying the standard your customers will apply on the rail.

Labels named as typical of the cream selection are UK high street: NEXT, M&S, Zara, Monsoon, Mango, Miss Selfridge and River Island. The company also says new goods arrive regularly and are mixed into most bags, so a proportion of unworn stock turns up in the cream sacks.

Pack sizes follow the grade

• General clothing is baled from 45 kg up to 350 kg.
• The top grades are packed into 25 kg and 130 kg.
• Cream goes into sealed 25 kg sacks, composed so each bag holds a spread of blouses, dresses, skirts and fashion tops rather than a single item type.
• Sacks of 25 kg and 45 kg are offered specifically for the Botswana trade.
• Triple AAA Boutique Mix comes in 25 kg sacks: summer blouses, dresses, jeans and skirts for boutique retail.
• Grade A Africa Mix is a light tropical mix, with an itemised winter selection available separately.

The logic is consistent throughout: the more valuable the grade, the smaller the pack. A 25 kg sealed sack of cream can be sold intact to a shop owner who wants a ready-made rail, while a 350 kg bale of general clothing is a wholesale unit that somebody downstream will break open.

No minimum order, and why that matters

Two lines on the site are unusual enough to be the practical reason to contact this company. There is no minimum order if you want to try a few bags on your next truck, and if you are loading a container elsewhere you are welcome to include just a few of their bales.

Almost everything else in this directory starts at a full container or a tonne. An open door at a few sacks does two things. For a new buyer it turns a five-figure commitment into a cheap test of whether British cream actually sells in your market. For an established buyer it means you can keep your volume with your main sorter and still top up each container with a different supplier's top grade, which is the low-risk way to compare two houses on the same shelf in the same week. Anyone assembling a wholesale programme should keep at least one supplier like this on the list for exactly that reason.

Stock is also held for UK market traders and car booters: socks, underwear, swimwear, jeans, winter coats, jumpers, fleece, and new goods and returns. Categories run across ladies, children's and men's, and bag composition changes with the season. Contact is [email protected] and 07961 417474. If you are comparing second-hand clothing suppliers on cream specifically, the 5 percent figure is the benchmark to carry into every other conversation.

Frequently asked questions

Where is Euro Export UK based?

At Storage King, 133 Birmingham Road, Birmingham B71 4JZ, in the West Midlands.

What share of the intake is cream?

The company states that cream is about 5 percent of second-hand clothing, selected on quality, strength of colour, brands and cleanliness.

What bale and sack weights are used?

Clothing is baled from 45 kg to 350 kg, top grades are packed at 25 kg and 130 kg, and cream goes into sealed 25 kg sacks. Sacks of 25 kg and 45 kg are offered for Botswana.

Is there a minimum order?

No. The company invites buyers to try a few bags on their next truck, and will let you add a few bales to a container you are loading elsewhere.

Which markets does it supply?

East and West Africa, South Africa and Eastern Europe, plus UK market traders and car boot sellers.